Customers today tend to carry tangible cash (coins & bills) less often and in decreasing amounts than in the past. While modern vending machines are able to offer customers information about the products offered for sale, such as dietary, allergy, and content information in addition to the usual convenience, the prices of merchandise and transaction fees charged by the payment processing networks (credit, debit cards) continue to increase. These trends slow and impede vending machine purchases with tangible cash and/or credit cards. But the speed and convenience of unattended transactions with vending machines offer opportunities for new and improved payment systems. These new payment features have been made possible through a variety of physical, visual and electronic inputs/outputs incorporated directly in the vending apparatus and certain new standalone mobile devices. The greater variety and complexity of products offered through vending machines and the need to hold prices down require greater flexibility in the financial compensation systems for the vended items.
Typically, prior art vending machines required the presentation of currency directly to receiving slots in the machine and receipt of any required change in another slot. Alternatively, the insertion of a financial card type of device into a card reading slot in the vending machine would enable delivery of the item to the buyer. With the advent of the internet and the many mobile data and video devices, transfer of funds from one account to another for payment of purchases or otherwise has become largely electronic.
There is a need for flexible digital payments using portable electronic devices, such as smartphones and tablets, with compatibility with traditional currency and credit cards, reduced transaction costs, economic savings in creation and use, and transactional security for vending machine transactional and payment operations improvements.